In the BBC Three TV program “Secrets of the Superbrands,” Alex Riley explores the world of the superbrands – how they get us to buy their products, trust them and even idolize them

“The scenes I witnessed at the opening of the new Apple store in London’s Covent Garden were more like an evangelical prayer meeting than a chance to buy a phone or a laptop,” Alex Riley reports for BBC News. “The strangeness began a couple of hours before the doors opened to the public. Inside the store, glassy-eyed staff were whipped up into a frenzy of excitement, jumping up and down, clapping and shouting. When the doors finally opened, they hysterically ‘high-fived’ and cheered hundreds of delirious customers flooding in through the doors for hours on end.”

“And what did those customers – some who’d travelled from as far away as the US and China and slept on the pavement for the privilege – find when they finally got inside? Well, all the same stuff as in the Apple store half a mile away on Regent Street. No special offers, no free gifts (a few t-shirts were handed out), no exclusive products,” Riley reports. “Now that’s devotion.”

“I searched high and low for answers. The Bishop of Buckingham – who reads his Bible on an iPad – explained to me the similarities between Apple and a religion,” Riley reports. “And when a team of neuroscientists with an MRI scanner took a look inside the brain of an Apple fanatic it seemed the bishop was on to something. The results suggested that Apple was actually stimulating the same parts of the brain as religious imagery does in people of faith.”

“Secrets of the Superbrands” can be seen online via iPlayer (UK only) here.

MacDailyNews Note: Apple cultists, this year’s annual cult of Apple indoctrination will be held in San Francisco, June 6-10. Even if you don’t have tickets to potentially hear The Master speak and bathe in His RDF, you can still participate. Every evening, we’ll hop into the vans and go door to door spreading the iOS gospel, selling iTunes Gift Cards and, of course, soliciting Windows to Mac switchers. As usual, the Kool-aid reception is planned for later each night – all are welcome. Do not forget your robes!

You don’t know me, and yet, that didn’t deter you from lumping me in your gross (and incorrect) generalisation; subjecting me to some snide (an understatement) comments (blowing up people for trotting Android phones etc.) all based on your preconceived assumptions and apparent limited logic.

I won’t stoop to your level.

I won’t even bother to defend myself from your lowly comment, which I believe was suffice to undermine you and perhaps the cause(s) you may champion (Android is it?).

Anyway, here’s my thought on the original report: the BBC programme could have done better to understand the shared/common thread between religion and the objects/products that allure so many millions of people to vote with their wallets, is the emotional attachment. It’s not faith, because, religion you may follow blindly without never having seen God, but Apple products are right in front of you. You don’t have to trust them, or like them, but faith doesn’t come in to play other than from reputation. Most of us have made informed decisions to use them, and can back up the rationales and their logical progressions, hardly the faculty of blind faith.

The allures themselves shouldn’t seem accidental, because that’s what a marketer of any successful product would ensure. Heck, that’s what nature does. If we like the bright primary colours, nature will oblige us and/or the insects with bright flowers in bloom. Manipulative? Perhaps, but hardly a news.

It’s also a misinformation that all Apple devices share the same allure and work on the same level on their users. I personally prefer the look and feel of OS 7.1; not a big fan of the OS-X GUI (though still prefer it far over all the current alternatives). There are plenty of folks here who don’t care for the Aqua feel and have switched to the Graphite feel.

In that example alone, it is apparent to me that dissenting views exist among the “worshipers”, and I won’t even include the matte vs. gloss screen champions in this.

What kind of rigid religion is this then that tolerates these differing views?

Simple, these are the faithfuls to the shrine of taste, ethical behaviours, hoodwink free choices, devotion and promises to sustained innovation, and products that are emotionally enriching instead of being more so than detached, but hostile to the owners.

You are welcome to join, but really, it’s your call. Life’s too short to worship falsehood and FUDs. You may only end up cheating yourself.

Wow. Sometimes you feel people are just too angry and their lives too short to learn some kind of a sense od humor. Maybe I should’ve included a smiley somewhere, but I don’t mind that you åroved my point (which was between the lines; see now?).

Atheism tends to exalt reason, but it is actually irrational. Atheists tend to put a lot of stock in the empirical method and in logic. One cannot disprove God exists using the empirical method.

You might reply: But I can’t disprove a giant purple frog on Mars controls the universe, either. Granted, one can never disprove any given thing exists. The atheistic position denying God’s existence, if based on the empirical method, is absurd.

Why do I say that? In order to prove the assertion No God exists experimentally, one would need to comprehensively know all of reality. Comprehensive knowledge of reality is called omniscience. One would need to be omniscient in order to prove there is no God, but if one were omniscient one would, by definition, already be God!

So, based on empirical methodology, the only one capable of disproving the existence of God would be God himself! But some would say you can indeed assert something does not exist if its existence is logically self contradictory, such as a square triangle. By definition it cannot exist. It is illogical for something to be a square and to also be a triangle. Again, granted, but this line of reasoning assumes logic and real meaning exist and are our basis for knowledge –something an atheist has no right to assert.

The existence of God is not only logically possible, it is philosophically essential. One cannot prove logic exists unless one first presupposes a God in whom reason and meaning are transcendentally rooted, otherwise these categories are mere philosophical prejudices.

Atheism is inherently self-contradictory. The evidence for the existence of God is there for all to see, only we refuse to see it. King David wrote: The fool says in his heart there is no God. (Psalm 14:1) In other words, Atheism is irrational.

Not only that, but in their insecurity (after all, ironically, they risk all they have on a belief without factual basis; I do the nearly same, but all my bases are covered), atheists feel the need to belittle believers and crassly and constantly shove, sans any proof whatsoever, “there is no God” in the faces of those who believe.

I say that I do nearly the same, because if you look closely enough, you can see God everywhere. Oh, you say, what about Hitler, natural disasters, a pregnant woman in a car wreck, etc? Well that assumes that God values human life the way most humans do. Perhaps there is something of greater value beyond mere human existence? That what seems to matter so much here on earth is of little or no meaning in the grand scheme of things? Perhaps the great value placed on a human life is misplaced. Maybe the actual life isn’t the thing of real value? Maybe, having a good soul is really all that matters, not how long you lived or how you died? If what’s important is how you lived and what’s most valuable is post-human life, then maybe our conception of a tragedy isn’t a tragedy at all?

So, apparently, being an atheist also means being someone who lacks even the most basic manners. Regardless, I pray for their souls even as they mock me and claim, baselessly, that I am wasting my time.

My position remains: To me, all religions are equally absurd. I don’t deny that “God” exists, or even assert “God” does not exist. That argument can’t be made either way as there is simply no empirical evidence for the existence of any supernatural entity(s). I respect other’s beliefs as long as they have no effect on me. But too many Christians in my experience want to control my behavior, in some way, shape or form, for me to respect them as a whole. Individually, I don’t mock you (the “absurd” comment only applies to the dogma.) More power to you, etc. I won’t try to dissuade you or otherwise proselytize. It’s your life. Have a nice one. Try not to be so bitter about those who don’t share your beliefs. If you want to pray for me, I can’t stop you, but please don’t bother.

“To me, all religions are equally absurd. I don’t deny that “God” exists, or even assert “God” does not exist. That argument can’t be made either way as there is simply no empirical evidence for the existence of any supernatural entity(s)”

Atheists think just like that, but consider that the mere suggestion of a deity is ridiculous and thus deny it. Otherwise, you’d have to adopt the same posture for just about *any* kind of crap people spew out. That’s when Russell’s Teapot and Invisible Pink Unicorn come along.

Please define “deity.” Creator of the Universe? Magic old Caucasian man with a flowing white beard? Alien race that visited Earth in the distant past? I’m open to consider any evidence of any of the above or whatever one may define as a deity. But without proof, they are all equally unlikely. Personally, I like the alien race idea, very scifi. But belief depends on a jump in logic that I simply can’t make. Others are of course free to do so, just don’t bully me into accepting the fictional rules that inevitably go along with those beliefs.

‘I’m a Believer’, I dig your post when your getting spiritual, “Perhaps there is something greater beyond mere human existence”, but what makes me roll my eyes, is when this spirituality always gets pointed to a greater consciousness, and then refined into a God, a magical man in the sky who created everything and who will also grant wishes to those who pray to him.

It’s really hard for rational people to take that seriously. Then what really blows me away is that I’m sure you’d laugh off the existence of Leprechauns, Unicorns, Fairies, and Genies. But to atheists, God is one and the same, a magical myth. You say, to just look closely all around you to see God.. I do look all around, and all I see is a bunch of stuff happening, good and bad. The stuff happening has no direction, no master plan, there’s nothing divine about it. As much as things change is as much as they stay the same… Now that can be seen as pretty spiritual, but there is no consciousness involved.

What makes atheists eventually get vocal and annoyed about people shouting “I love God.” is that they won’t shut up about it… just like an Apple evangelist. If that Apple evangelist non-stop nags their non-Apple friends that they need to get on the Apple bandwagon, they’re going to just irritate their friends if their friends aren’t interested. Another big point. People who love Apple aren’t interested in getting into politics so that they can pass laws that everyone has to use Apple products and abide by Apple’s laws. (for those who are sleeping, a metaphor for religious kooks getting into government and passing “God’s laws” upon the people).

And finally, I am an Apple zealot, and the big reason I love Apple so much, is that they actually ship products, awesome products! Regarding religion and God, vaporware.

You misquoted me. I wrote, “Perhaps there is something of greater value beyond mere human existence?”

I was wondering that in the context of each of us – our existences, not referring to God.

What I meant was: Perhaps there is something of greater value to each of us beyond our mere human existence, for example, our souls? We think this life (here on earth) is so important and treat it as all there is, but what if, to God, it’s simply not very important at all? What if to God, it doesn’t matter if we were swept away by a tsunami or killed on a highway since our soul survives anyway? What if, to God, our immediate family (whether we lose one or they lose us) doesn’t even matter much, but what matters most is that we are all one family and the condition of our soul? That would explain a lot of things.

People are very wrapped up in what they perceive as important within the confines of human life. That’s why they question the existence of God when something “bad” happens. But what if something we consider “bad” is really of little or no importance in the grand scheme of things?

If you are a believer just to “cover your bases,” then you aren’t a true believer. You are the type of person that will be extremely fearful on your deathbed, proving the fact that you doubt.

That type of person is simply scared of being wrong based on the fabricated risk/reward premise that being wrong in one direction is “no harm/no foul,” but being wrong in the other direction is eternal punishment.

Please, spare me the useless platitudes. They have no value. Morality exists in the absence of religion. Ethics exist in the absence of religion. I do not need your risk/reward paradigm to lead a “good” life.

I have no doubt and therefore believe that all my bases are covered. It’s a figure of speech. My only point in using it is that those who believe in God and atheists both share one thing: blind faith, but if believers are wrong, no harm no foul. Atheists risk much more.

I see God everywhere and I think many people get confused because they can’t see the forest for the trees.

If they do not believe in an “afterlife,” then atheists are not “risking” anything. And that is even assuming that an “afterlife” requires a higher being. Keep believing, if it makes you happy. But please leave me out of it.

Perhaps you are the one who is confused? What you define as seeing a “deity” everywhere, I see nature. Face it, your rationalization does not make any sense to someone who does not “believe” in the first place. Be satisfied with your own belief and leave others to theirs.

General comment, not directed to Believer:

The primary flaw in most organized religions is the push to proselytize and impose the faith. There is nothing more dangerous than religion actively promoting itself through legislation.

“I see God everywhere and I think many people get confused because they can’t see the forest for the trees.”

I concur. Why ‘god’ is not self-evident to everyone is of concern to me. But I figure: (A) I might be nuts, (B) Everyone has their own path and may to be ready to notice ‘god’, or (C) Our culture damages people with its obsessions about game playing (such as the symbolic concept of ‘money’ and accompanying financial games) that people become blinded by such cultural abuse. All I know is that, as a rabbi once taught me, “There are 40 paths to God”, which is to say that the paths are infinite. Everyone follows an individual path of their own.

Who are we to judge? We can only encourage individual growth.

Meanwhile, as humans, I often point out that We Never Know Everything About Anything. We’re simply not capable.

This is metaphysical BS. The difference between a metaphysicist and a physicist is that a physicist has one or more laboratories, and can test his/her assertions. If an entity is defined as not being observable or measurable in the physical time-space continuum we inhabit, then the physicist can make no assertions about the properties of said entity as they can’t be verified. The exact same is true of the metaphysicist. So saying God must exist because the physicist cannot detect God is an illogical circular argument. On the other hand, one can test whether various events in this time-space continuum has or have not occurred by examination of physical evidence. Comprehensive knowledge of “reality” is not required. Nor is it possible; quantum behavior ensure that.

Metaphysical assertions about the existentialism and logic presupposing a God are just as unverifiable as God itself. Metaphysics is based on layers and layers of unverifiable assertions and conclusions based on unverifiable assertions. (Remember, the metaphysicist for some reason is not held to the same standard as the physicist.) It has no more internal consistency than the reason-based belief systems of those with whom it disagrees.

So what is the purpose of proclaiming belief in God under these conditions? God can’t be observed regardless of your belief position. The metaphysicist has no more claim to the truth of his assertions than the physicist in these cases. The only benefit of any position is personal.

That is an assumption without supporting facts.
Atheism is the very definition of being rational as atheism roots itself in logic, not believes.

>Atheists tend to put a lot of stock in the empirical >method and in logic.

There is nothing else.

> One cannot disprove God exists using the empirical >method.

No. But statistical and logical reasoning can.
Ask yourself : how reasonable probable is the assumption that a being exists that is not only invisible, but also defies the space-time continuum and all physical laws. Not very likely, right?

Such a being has the same probability of a bearded man that delivers 6.8 billion presents in one night. Aka Santa Claus.

Yes, we can. In fact that is very easy. Mars surface has been cartographed and no frog has been seen.

> Granted, one can never disprove any given thing exists.

Wrong. That’s a logical fallacy that is often used by irrational believers. In fact you can. Falsification is a common procedure to verify a theory.

> The atheistic position denying God’s existence, if based >on the empirical method, is absurd.

Why? Quite the contrary. There is no god ’cause a) no god is required to explain the universe, b) it’s against the logic to assume there is one, c) there is no proof to support the theory of a god but on the other hand quite a lot to falsify that theory.

>Why do I say that?

Because you feel uncomfortable to accept that there is no god, that everyone is responsible for himself, that there is no after-life, no heaven and no one to safe you from whatever.

>In order to prove the assertion No God exists

The opposite is true. Believers have to prove the theory that god does exist.

> experimentally, one would need to comprehensively >know all of reality.

No. Not necessarily.
But EVERYTHING we know speaks against the theory of one or more gods.

>One would need to be omniscient in order to prove there >is no God, but if one were omniscient one would, by >definition, already be God!

Wrong. The common theory of god includes the power to create the universe. Not only to know everything about it.
Knowing everything doesn’t create a universe, thus we wouldn’t be gods. Just very smart.

>So, based on empirical methodology,

Wrong. Your ‘prove’ is based on false assumptions and logical fallacy. It’s far away from being ’empirical’. I doubt that you even know what empirical methodology actually means.

>but this line of reasoning assumes logic and real meaning >exist and are our basis for knowledge –something an >atheist has no right to assert.

Atheist have every right to assert. There is nothing else than logic in science.

>The existence of God is not only logically possible,

Nope. It is in fact totally illogical and contradicts science, logic, reasoning, experience and the observed reality.

>it is philosophically essential.

No it is not. God is not necessary. For no one.
You can perfectly life without one.

BTW : Which god? Allah? Jehova? The nordic gods?

God is a construction, born in the human minds to soother weak and irrational minds, to irrationally explain events that weren’t explainable otherwise (like lightnings, etc)

>One cannot prove logic exists unless one first >presupposes a God in whom reason and meaning are >transcendentally rooted,

Ehhhh…. no….
Why should one. Logic is a form of intellectual reasoning. Believing in god is the exact opposite as it doesn’t require reasoning but a leap of faith without a proper basis.

>Atheism is inherently self-contradictory. The evidence for >the existence of God is there for all to see, only we refuse >to see it.

There is no god and there was never even a hint of a prove.

> King David wrote:

Wrong. The bible is a fairy tale written by humans who lifed centuries after the mythological persona called Jesus. And even millennia after Moses. Most of the text has been invented to tell a story. Nothing else.

>In other words, Atheism is irrational.

Nope. That’s a circular argument, not a real one. You assume that your irrational believe without prove is a prove to think otherwise is irrational. THAT’S irrational.

Which is why I don’t try. I have no reason to convince anyone that there is no god, just as they have no reason to try to convince me (unfortunately most don’t see it that way).

I find it interesting that those who often are supposed to be so devout in their faith seem to be the ones who are the most insecure. It gets quite tiring to have someone try to convince me that I am wrong and will suffer eternal damnation.

This is the wrong thread and place for it, and I apologise for adding more to this. But I felt compelled to respond, as briefly as I may, to dispel what I see are some attempted logic grounded on assumptions and fallacies. I.e. I’ll just take this 3rd paragraph from your post:

1.
“In order to prove the assertion No God exists experimentally, one would need to comprehensively know all of reality. Comprehensive knowledge of reality is called omniscience.”

This appears to be an assumption that only by knowing all of reality will it reveal whether God’s existence is a myth or real. If your reality is a subset of God reality, you can not exceed/stretch your reality outside the meta reality (by stepping outside the box you’re currently in order to prove its existence, in layman’s term). You would then extended the reality and are still therefore inside of it.

At the same time, if you decide to just explore the reality from within (reaching its limit that is) Gödel’s incompleteness theorems would have you frustrated to extrapolate reality’s logical end to ever sufficiently prove God’s existence. Seems like a catch 22, where only faith may tread fair.

So, that first sentence there, is an assumption that may not yield much. Besides, I could have just as easily suggested that even knowing everything, being an omniscient with a fantastic database, still would require you to process and Omni-understand (don’t know the Latin for it) all that data to arrive at the correct conclusion. So, being omniscient may not suffice. Which brings forth the second point and the fallacy in that paragraph:

2.
“One would need to be omniscient in order to prove there is no God, but if one were omniscient one would, by definition, already be God! ”

That’s a fallacy. Omniscient is not so much a God’s definition than it is an attribute. It can be used to define him, just like the colour green can define certain attributes of a green tabletop, but not the table in its entirety.

God entity can have other attributes as well, for all we know. He can be all merciful, and even be omnipotent and so on. Therefore, making one achieve omniscience alone, does not necessarily a God make. That’s the second assumption in the same paragraph.

Superior Being makes a good opening argument here — claiming you can prove God does not exist is as silly as claiming you can prove he does. However, the rest of his post simply falls apart in a crumble of tautologies and other logical fallacies, such as post hoc, burden of proof, and begging the question. The fact that I cannot prove god does not exist does not mean there is the slightest reason to believe he does.

Peace be upon you and may Flying Spaghetti Monster bless you with his noodly goodness.

does your philosophical need to identify one and only one creator mean that we must worship that creator which did his magic billions of years before the appearance of the present judeo-christian and muslim prophets and their subsequent sheep/followers? is it conceivable that the one creator you believe in might no longer exist or perhaps does not wish to be worshipped? What explains the complete lack of true, obvious, recordable 2-way communication between mankind and your creator? If you were god, would you be silent to the continued evil that some of your flock does?

What type of god would accept the unchaste multiplication of inferior computers and crappy software?

@Superior Being
I will not debate your “logic” as its basis is faulty. You start out with a truism and diverge into self-serving rationalization from that point onwards. Why don’t you prove that a higher being exists? ‘Nuff said.

Fundamentally, I have no need to disprove the existence of a higher being. It is irrelevant to me. I don’t even claim to be an atheist. I am an agnostic who is not concerned one bit about not knowing and inherently distrusts both the fervently religious and the fervently anti-religious as being at least a bit off. People believe and disbelieve in all kinds of things without going to the effort of proving or disproving them.

Just don’t try to cram your belief (or non-belief) down my throat. Then we will have a serious problem. I strongly prefer not to waste my time on such speculation. Perhaps I’ll find out when I die. Perhaps not.

Good work, Superior Being. You posted the ramblings of some nutjob from the internet. Give yourself a pat on the back.

“In order to prove the assertion No God exists experimentally, one would need to comprehensively know all of reality. Comprehensive knowledge of reality is called omniscience. One would need to be omniscient in order to prove there is no God, but if one were omniscient one would, by definition, already be God!”

…And by that same token, a person would also have to be omniscient in order to prove there IS a God. In otherwords, a person would have to BE God to prove the existence of God.

So going by that lunatic’s own trainwreck of logic, there are ony two possibilities: 1., people who believe in God are just as irrational and self-contradictory as athiests. 2., Every person who knows that God exists is actually God, because to know he exists means that you must be God yourself, leading to some kind of insane paradox that infinitely folds in on itself.

Yup, that guy’s case is air tight. Air. Tight.

@I’m a Believer“Be if you look closely enough, you can see God everywhere.”

Hah hah, oh religion. You and your lovable, zany defence mechanisms!

“There’s no evidence that God exists, not now, not ever”. “Oh yes there is! You just aren’t looking hard enough! Infact, if you can’t see him everywhere, then you KNOW you aren’t looking hard enough!”. “Okay, so you can see him, right? Then why don’t you just point him out to me?”. “Umm… Well, uh…. No. I can’t. Because… Umm… Because you can only see him for yourself. Yeah, that’s the ticket!”.

“If God’s so great, why do really bad things happen?”. “Well, you see, lowly mortals like us couldn’t possibly fathom God’s will. Who knows what he’s thinking? We don’t! So you really shouldn’t even try to make sense out of it… Or question our dogma…”

“Regardless, I pray for their souls even as they mock me and claim, baselessly, that I am wasting my time.”

I prayed to God to never make his followers be aggressive, patronizing, self-absorbed doucheholes. Didn’t work.

Also, and on topic, I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that brand loyalty in general stimulates the same areas of the brain. It’s not something about Apple specifically.

“You might reply: But I can’t disprove a giant purple frog on Mars controls the universe, either. Granted, one can never disprove any given thing exists. The atheistic position denying God’s existence, if based on the empirical method, is absurd.”

By your logic then, it is absurd to deny the existence of the universe controlling, giant purple frog on Mars? Did I read that right? I cannot for certain say that the “Eternal Frog” – All Hail Him – does not exist, but I wouldn’t go as far as calling it absurd to say, “I don’t think so.” Can I say, for example, that Apple will not go bankrupt tomorrow with 100% certainty? No, I can’t. But I consider it highly unlikely.

There are of course two distinct arguments that often blur when atheism is discussed. 1) The existence of a/any God/Intelligent Creator/Creative Force and 2) The correctness of any human interpretation of what that being(s)/force actually is/are like. To argue for the existence of Yahweh, or Zeus, or Odin, or Osiris, et al, is a very different conversation than to argue the first point of a creative force and if it is intelligent or not.

To me Zeus and Yahweh and giant purple universe controlling frogs on Mars are equally likely. I cannot disprove them, but I do not feel the need to as the burden of proof would fall to their followers to prove their assertion to me of their God’s existence, rather than for me to disprove it. In this way, I am an atheist. I do not put faith in, from what I can see, are manmade stories.

As far as the first point goes (what created everything?), I have to default, “I don’t know” because none of us do. In this way, I suppose you would call me agnostic. However, again, not being able to say with 100% certainty, does not mean it’s even odds on any given explanation, or even close for that matter. There are those who try to figure out the questions of the universe. They come up with hypothesis, and test them, and work toward an answer; and there are those who make up an answer that they like, and proclaim anyone how disagrees with them to be a fool.

If you are talking of an intelligent creator(s), then I would borrow an argument for the perspective of evolution from Richard Dawkins. He states that highly evolved things (like humans and something that is beyond human, like a God) come necessarily later in time than simple things (atoms, elements) so the only way an intelligent creator of everything could exist is to put them outside of our reality, beyond our universe if you will. If however, we accept such an argument, then absolutely anything could be outside our reality and beyond the rules of our universe and it becomes clear that anyone who asserts to “know” what is outside our universe is just making things up.

Though I must admit, to the polytheists’ favor, I sometimes feel as though we were actually designed by committee.😉

Now if you are talking of Einstein’s God (who, “…doesn’t play dice.”), the God of the natural order of things, or the mechanics of the universe if you will, that seems reasonable to me, but I would not call it God so as to avoid confusion.

The Einstein option makes more sense to me in the same way that a tsunami being caused by tectonic plates shifting makes more sense to me than Poseidon being angry with the people of Japan.

Atheists are often accused of believing that something came from nothing, but I would argue that the religious do the same. After all, whence cometh God(s)? If “He”/”She”/”They” has/have always been and always will be, would it not be possible, and perhaps even more likely, that some unintelligent force has been and always will be (or even was and is no more) caused creation of all we know? A force creates matter which begets stars, which begets planets which sometimes beget life, which begets new forms of life, etc. until we reach the present.

An interesting note: a Belgian Priest by the name of Georges Lemaître, was the first person to propose the Big Bang theory. — Sometimes we do not even understand what we are arguing about.

But empiricism =/= reason, genius. Guess that’s what happens when you pretend to talk to a deity for too long.

“So, based on empirical methodology, the only one capable of disproving the existence of God would be God himself!”

Exactly! That’s a fallacy, and thus, BULLSHIT…

” One cannot prove logic exists unless one first presupposes a God in whom reason and meaning are transcendentally rooted, otherwise these categories are mere philosophical prejudices.”

… AND SO IS THAT!

“this line of reasoning assumes logic and real meaning exist and are our basis for knowledge.”

Yes, it does.

” –something an atheist has no right to assert”

What?

“Atheism is inherently self-contradictory. The evidence for the existence of God is there for all to see, only we refuse to see it. King David wrote: The fool says in his heart there is no God. (Psalm 14:1) In other words, Atheism is irrational.”

So you’re saying (again) that God exists because someone who believed in God 4000 years ago said so?

Sensible atheists don’t seek to disprove anything. We go about our daily lives, content in the knowledge that there is absolutely no rational reason for any person to assert that a superior being of any stripe exists or it even worth considering.

Like every other religious nut, you rely on a book to “prove” the existence of your god. A book? How damned irrational can you get? Why not worship James Bond, Sherlock Holmes, Santa Claus, the Easter bunny.

In other words, believe what you want. Just leave me and my kids out of the equation. And stop spouting off-topic bullshit in here.

I liked something I read: religion is like your penis. Don’t take it out in public and don’t ram it down your kids’ throats.

“The existence of God is not only logically possible, it is philosophically essential.”

Philosophically essential….. ???? nope I can’t see why that would be. Or this.

“One cannot prove logic exists unless one first presupposes a God in whom reason and meaning are transcendentally rooted, otherwise these categories are mere philosophical prejudices.”

How exactly is the existence of logic dependent on God. Surely logic is a set of rules that reflect (or describe) the actual nature of a frame of reference. Surely God is only essential of you have religion as your frame of reference (I imagine some regions might not have a God, but they will have a set of rules, i.e. logic).

Oh and…

“Atheism is inherently self-contradictory. The evidence for the existence of God is there for all to see, only we refuse to see it. King David wrote: The fool says in his heart there is no God. (Psalm 14:1) In other words, Atheism is irrational.”

The first thing that popped into mind for me was, “What else activates that region of the brain.?”

Then I remembered that when people are asked about “Gods” opinions on things, the region that activates is the same region as when we are asked about our opinions, as opposed to the region when one is asked about their uncle’s opinions. So perhaps, the region is that which we identify ourselves. Apple fanatics have incorporated the brand into their self-image and as such, it has a similar importance as those who have incorporated Jesus or Allah into their self-image.

As Steve Jobs exists and speaks to us about his ideal world, in “Religion” crooks, no I mean preachers speaks to people about “god’s” ideal world.

As Apple fans are excited about something that actually improve their lives, the “religious zealots” also are excited about something that do improve “their” lives. I hope to believe majority of people follow the preachers that teaches God’s or Allah’s words that improve everyones’ lives. Unfortunately there are “crooks” and/or power hungry monsters who make their followers to believe and be excited about improving just their own lives. Sometime I as I suspect many Atheists believe, there are more of latter.

So, Atheism is just another religion in this context. I like how John Lennon put it, “just imagine.” One of my favorite songs, but I’m too weak to image, so I choose to believe in God.

Oh yes there is. God has been invented and imagined by humans. Steve Jobs, and I’m not saying he is god, is a real human. Apple is a real company, the holy scripts (Tora, Bible, etc) are just invented fairy tales.

>As Steve Jobs exists and speaks to us about his ideal world, in
>“Religion” crooks, no I mean preachers speaks to people about
> “god’s” ideal world.

Unlike Religions, you are free to disagree. Disagreeing with your religion COULD lead to be expelled from it. Or worse. In the case of medieval christianity or extreme islam : death.

Disagreeing with Apple means nothing at all.
You are not a member of the Church of Apple.

>As Apple fans are excited about something that actually >improve their lives,

Which can be measured. For example saved minutes/hours due to better work flow. Or less stress due to better software.

>the “religious zealots” also are excited about something that do >improve “their” lives.

They BELIEVE it improves their lives. No. Even worse : they think it will improve their supposed (but not existing) after-lifes when they are dead.

> I hope to believe majority of people follow the preachers that >teaches God’s or Allah’s words that improve everyones’ lives.

Preacher preach invented stuff, invented to control the masses.

It would be same if I would read Hitchhikers Guide to Galaxy and listeners would believe it will improve their lives.

>So, Atheism is just another religion in this context.

Logical fallacy. Atheism means to NOT believe in a religion/god/whatever. Not believing is the opposite of believing. By definition, it can’t be another religion

>I like how John Lennon put it, “just imagine.” One of my favorite
>songs, but I’m too weak to image, so I choose to believe in >God.

That’s what I say : religion is for the weak minds unable to accept reality.

Glassy-eyed and high-fives? Is this guy sure it wasn’t a Microsoft store? Apple Store employees don’t go in for high-fives and other “we’re so bad-arse” displays because they’re already confident of their tech choices.

@ Supreme Being
I cannot prove the Flying Spaghetti Monster does not exist.
Plus, he has the same “proofs” as all the religions do of their gods:
– HE has a book that says he exists
– and HE has followers
Covert to the one true church… The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster:http://www.venganza.org/